Choppers often find it difficult to find a
practice partner who is steady enough to consistently
attack their chops. Over the years, I have coached a
number of choppers, among them; Derek May a Pan American
Silver Medal winner. In setting up their training plans,
working with the Newgy Robo Pong 2000 has always been an
essential element of their training. The Robot provides
the consistent attack that is necessary for the chopper
to work on his/her placement and movement. The Robot is
so versatile that an almost limitless variety of drills
are possible. Here are a few of the basic drills that I
have my chopping students do at each workout.

Drill 1 - Forehand In and Out
Set your Robot for topspin at a ball speed and feed that
is about 75% of what you can comfortably return. Direct
the Robot's shots to your forehand with no oscillation.
Practice chopping from mid-distance and gradually work
your way in towards the table. Repeat moving in and out
to practice your ability to take your opponent's ball at
different distances from the table. Repeat this drill
using your backhand.

Stroke Tip: The closer you are to the table the
higher your back swing must start and the shorter and
more downward your follow-through. Close to the table
your contact point on the ball is towards the middle.
When back from the table your contact point is towards
the bottom of the ball and your follow-through will be
longer and more forward.

Drill 2 - Chopping to a Location
Set your Robot for topspin at a ball speed and feed that
is about 80% of what you can return. Set the Robot on
full table oscillation. Practice making all your returns
towards one of three positions (deep to forehand or
backhand corner, or deep to the middle). Repeat this
drill until you have practiced making all returns to each
location.

Drill 3 - Covering the Middle
Set your Robot for topspin at a ball speed and feed that
is about 80% of what you can return. Set the Robot to
oscillate over one half of the table (positions 2 & 5).
Practice taking all your returns with either your
forehand or backhand. Focus on getting your body out of
the way for the return to your middle. Repeat using both
forehand and backhand.

Drill 4 - Serve Return Using One Side of the
Racket
This drill is designed for choppers using two different
types of rubber on their rackets. Set your Robot to
produce short sidespin-backspin serves. Set the Robot to
oscillate over the whole table. Practice receiving all
serves with your inverted side of the racket. Repeat
using the other side of the racket.

Drill 5 - Chop and Loop
Drill
Set your Robot for topspin at a ball speed and feed that
is about 80% of what you can return. Set the Robot to
oscillate over the forehand half of your table. Practice
mixing your chop returns with forehand loops. Repeat
setting the Robot to oscillate over the backhand side of
your table. Practice mixing backhand chops with
step-round forehand loops.

Drill 6 - Chop Reaction Drill
Set your Robot for topspin at the maximum ball speed
that you can handle with full table oscillation. Start on
a slow ball feed and have a helper gradually turn up the
feed to the highest speed. Practice on getting your
racket on as many balls as possible. Object of this drill
is to decrease your reaction time. With practice your
will find that you can handle even the highest feed
rate.

These are just a few of the chopping drills that
are possible on your Newgy Robo-Pong 2000. By using your
imagination your will be able to come up with many more.
Good luck and Good Chopping!